sales forecast

[wde]

i have recently completed an agreement to distribute what i feel is a blockbuster product. i feel my business model is sound and my management team is credible. the problem is obtaining financing. i need to be able to forecast sales of a product that has never been on the market nor is there a similar product available. i figure i could use the delphi method and find a product that my target demographic also buys that is similarly priced. then figure what percentage of that demographic resides within a radius of me and within the same radius of the other company and make a comparision. the problem with that is i have no where to look to find that data. does anyone on here have any ideas or maybe a different way of doing this.

[mthomas]

I'm not all that familiar with the delphi method (although it sounds familiar) however, are there any potential products already being sold that are similar to yours? Do you know who your competitors will be? Whoever is your closest competitors, offering the most similar product as possible, try to determine from there how they market, who they market to, what demographics they target, demographic location, etc... From there it may be easier to start estimating the sales volumes you may encounter, or at least roughly interpolate these findings to your own operations.

Google Trends and Google Keyword tools are great resources for determining search volumes. Maybe they could at least aid you in estimating sales growth?

[jasaunders]

As far as research for your forecast, you should be able to get data from the US Census Bureau and databases like TableBase and Business Source Complete for demographic and psychographic market research.